. On the day of DeMille's death, President McKay sent a telegram to the DeMille family stating that DeMille "merits the welcome, 'well done that good and faithful servant; enter thou into the rest prepared for the just.' . [231], According to Scott Eyman, DeMille's films were at the same time masculine and feminine due to his thematic adventurousness and his eye for the extravagant. [53] Another DeMille-Lasky production that opened in January 1912 was The Antique Girl. [184] While working in theatre, DeMille used real fruit trees in his play California as influenced by Belasco. With his editor, Anne Bauchens, DeMille used editing techniques to allow the visual images to bring the plot to climax rather than dialogue. [15] The two were married on July 1, 1876, despite Beatrice's parents' objections because of the young couple's differing religions; Beatrice converted to Episcopalianism. Death: December 20, 1982 (68) Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California, United States. Notably, DeMille had cinematographer John P. Fulton create the parting of the Red Sea scene in his 1956 film The Ten Commandments, which was one of the most expensive special effects in film history, and has been called by Steven Spielberg "the greatest special effect in film history". Recommended For You. They were even required to expand to RKO sound studios for filming. finding aid. Cecil B. DeMille was born on August 12th, in 1881. [36] One of DeMille's affairs was with his screenwriter Jeanie MacPherson. [115] In 1916, DeMille purchased a mansion in Hollywood. DeMille made a 1905 reprise in Hamlet as Osric. Martin Scorsese cited Unconquered, Samson and Delilah, and The Greatest Show on Earth as DeMille films that have imparted lasting memories on him. [30] DeMille attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts (tuition-free due to his father's service to the Academy). However much I may dislike some of his pictures, it would be very silly of me, as a producer of commercial motion pictures, to demean for an instant his unparalleled skill as a maker of mass entertainment. Noisy and bright, it was not well-liked by critics, but was a favorite among audiences. [140][note 8] While concurrently filmmaking, he served in World War II at the age of sixty as his neighborhood air-raid warden. Cecil B. DeMille Birthday and Date of Death. [39] DeMille wrote a few of his own plays in-between stage performances, but his playwriting was not as successful. Between 1914 and 1956, he made seventy feature films; all but seven were profitable. [107] Aside from The King of Kings, none of DeMille's films away from Paramount were successful. [248], According to Sam Goldwyn, critics did not like DeMille's films, but the audiences did and "they have the final word". Apfel. [287][288] The Lasky-DeMille Barn was dedicated as a California historical landmark in a ceremony on December 27, 1956; DeMille was the keynote speaker. [32] Publicists wrote that he became an actor in order to learn how direct and produce, but DeMille admitted that he became an actor in order to pay the bills. Name in native language: Cecil Blount DeMille: Date of birth: 12 August 1881 Ashfield: Date of death: 21 January 1959 Hollywood: Cause of death: heart failure; Place of burial: Hollywood Forever Cemetery; Pseudonym: C.B. [73] Furthermore, DeMille influenced about half of Spielberg's films, including War of the Worlds. [187] DeMille's films Male and Female, Why Change Your Wife?, and The Affairs of Anatol can be retrospectively described as high camp and are categorized as "early DeMille films" due to their particular style of production and costume and set design. DeMille also was planning a film about the space race as well as another biblical epic about the Book of Revelation. Studio: A Cecil B. DeMille Production Paramount Pictures Premiered: February 4, 1938 Featured Cast: Fredric March, Franciska Gaal, Akim Tamiroff Producer-director: Cecil B. DeMille Screenwriter: Harold Lamb, Edwin Justus Mayer, C. Gardner Sullivan Source: Lyle Saxon's book Lafitte the Pirate Additional writers: Emily Barrye, Grover Jones, Jesse Lasky Jr., Jeanie Macpherson, Preston . Let's take a look back at 20 of his greatest movies, ranked worst to best. After Henry DeMille's death at age 40, Cecil's mother, Beatrice, ran a well-known boarding school for girls in Pompton Lakes, New Jersey. Work period (start) . [296] During the Apollo 11 mission, Buzz Aldrin refers to himself in one instance as "Cecil B. DeAldrin", as a humorous nod to DeMille. Film Director. . [130] From 1936 to 1945, he produced, hosted, and directed all shows with the occasional exception of a guest director. DeMille had considered making the film himself. [139] DeMille was anti-communist and abandoned a project in 1940 to film Ernest Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls due to its communist themes despite the fact he had already paid $100,000 for the rights to the novel. [132], DeMille sued the union for reinstatement but lost. [233] DeMille's 1956 version of The Ten Commandments, according to director Martin Scorsese, is renowned for its level of production and the care and detail that went into creating the film. [142] Jeanie MacPherson would work as a scriptwriter for many of DeMille's films. Birthplace: Laramie, Albany County, Wyoming, United States. The film was produced on a large budget of $600,000, the most expensive production at Paramount. The 1956 film was a partial remake of an earlier silent . [105] Consequently, DeMille left Paramount in 1924 despite having helped establish it. However, DeMille's second remake at MGM in 1931 would be a failure. Golden Globes 1953 - Best Director and Best . [83], DeMille's most successful film was The Cheat; DeMille's direction in the film was acclaimed. Many of these displays were thought to be staged, however, as an exercise in discipline. De Mille daughter dies. "Give me any two pages of the Bible, and I'll give you a picture." -Cecil B. DeMille. [213] DeMille did receive help in his films, notably from Alvin Wyckoff who shot forty-three of DeMille's films;[80] brother William deMille who would occasionally serve as his screenwriter;[82] and Jeanie Macpherson, who served as DeMille's exclusive screenwriter for fifteen years;[214] and Eddie Salven, DeMille's favorite assistant director. [232] In the early age of cinema, DeMille differentiated the Lasky Company from other production companies due to the use of dramatic, low-key lighting they called "Lasky lighting" and marketed as "Rembrandt lighting" to appeal to the public. [263] Joseph Henabery recalled that DeMille looked like "a king on a throne surrounded by his court" while directing films on a camera platform. [192] DeMille had large and frequent office conferences to discuss and examine all aspects of the working film including story-boards, props, and special effects. [32] At the age of twenty-one, Cecil B. DeMille married Constance Adams on August 16, 1902, at Adams's father's home in East Orange, New Jersey. [235] DeMille was also known for his use of special effects without the use of digital technology. [109] Six of DeMille's filmsThe Arab, The Wild Goose Chase, The Dream Girl, The Devil-Stone, We Can't Have Everything, and The Squaw Man (1918)were destroyed due to nitrate decomposition, and are considered lost. (Cecil Blount De Mille o DeMille; Ashfield, 1881 - Hollywood, 1959) Productor y director de cine estadounidense recordado especialmente por sus superproducciones de epopeyas histricas y religiosas. (1950) $10,000. To diseased proportions. [301][302], Cecil B. DeMille received many awards and honors, especially later in his career. Just two years before his death, and shortly after the release of his last film, The Ten Commandments, he delivered a commencement address at Brigham Young University. A lasting memory for DeMille was a lunch with his father and actor Edwin Booth. I'm ready for my close-up." Beatrice was intelligent, educated, forthright, and strong-willed. [188][189] DeMille recalled that one of the most influential plays he saw was Hamlet, directed by Sothern. [231] DeMille's distinctive style can be seen through camera and lighting effects as early as The Squaw Man with the use of daydream images; moonlight and sunset on a mountain; and side-lighting through a tent flap. Soon after, in 1959, he had another heart attack, which led to his death. Recent images. [47] DeMille sometimes worked with the director E.H. Sothern, who influenced DeMille's later perfectionism in his work. This concerned the executives at Paramount; however, the film turned out to be the studio's highest-grossing film. Film Director. [63] The Lasky Company wanted to attract high-class audiences to their films so they began producing films from literary works. In the 1950s, Paramount sold its entire pre-1948 film library, including those of DeMille, to, The set was discovered by Peter Brosnan after hearing a rumor in 1982 that DeMille had ordered the enormous set to be buried after filming rather than taken away. [10], Cecil B. DeMille's mother, Beatrice, a literary agent and scriptwriter, was the daughter of German Jews. The gathering drew 93,000, with short speeches by, While the film was a huge success, DeMille regretted that he could not share the success with his wife who had developed, The estate cycled through several different homeowners for the next 30 years until it was bought by American actress. education: American Academy Of Dramatic Arts, Pennsylvania Military College. Learning of the Eagles' work and keen to promote his film with their cause the director encouraged the group to donate carved stone tablets . However, this version is actually a 1918 re-release. Among his best-known films are The Ten Commandments (1956), Cleopatra (1934), and The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture. [21] DeMille's sister Agnes was born on April 23, 1891; his mother nearly did not survive the birth. DeMille, Cecil B. Radford, Bill. Billy Jim Hawkins . Occupations. Movie posters. He produced or directed about 80 movies - including The Ten Commandments (1956), a movie in the 'epic' genre for which he is probably best known today. September 17, 1914. Cecil B. DeMille American film director (1881-1959) . Cecil Blount Demille, known as Cecil B. DeMille, was a pioneering film director - in both silent and sound movies.Starting in 1913, he became a dominant force in the Hollywood film industry for 40 years. [160] A unique practice at the time, DeMille offered ten percent of his profit to the crew. [240] Moreover, before his religious-themed films, many of his silent era films revolved around "husband-and-wife-divorce-and-remarry satires", considerably more adult-themed. His silent films included social dramas, comedies, Westerns, farces, morality plays, and historical pageants. After reading the screenplay, Daniel A. Lord warned DeMille that Catholics would find the film too irreverent, while non-Catholics would have considered the film Catholic propaganda. DeMille also produced and directed plays. More Facts. [268] DeMille appeared as himself in numerous films, including the MGM comedy Free and Easy. [244] Another minor characteristic of DeMille's films include train crashes which can be found in several of his films. [180] and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2014. His poor physical condition upon his return home affected the production of his 1922 film Manslaughter. Between 1913 and 1956, he made a total of 70 features, both silent and sound films.He is acknowledged as a founding father of the cinema of the United States and the most commercially successful producer-director in film history. Carl Laemmle anniversary 1931.JPG 1,473 1,161; 359 KB. They struggled to adapt the play from the stage to the set. [72] DeMille adapted Belasco's dramatic lighting techniques to film technology, mimicking moonlight with U.S. cinema's first attempts at "motivated lighting" in The Warrens of Virginia. William deMille reluctantly became a story editor. Lasky and DeMille maintained the widow Fleming on the payroll; however, according to leading actor House Peters Sr. DeMille refused to stop production for the funeral of Fleming. 1 reference. [168] In the months before his death, DeMille was researching a film biography of Robert Baden-Powell, the founder of the Scout Movement. Cecil B DeMille Bio Details. [138] Critics were impressed with the visuals but found the scripts dull, calling it DeMille's "poorest Western". [271] DeMille was immortalized in Billy Wilder's Sunset Boulevard when Gloria Swanson spoke the line: "All right, Mr. DeMille. [247] Adjusted for inflation, DeMille's remake of The Ten Commandments is the eighth highest-grossing film in the world. [155], We have just lived through a war where our people were systematically executed. heart failure. imported from Wikimedia project. [90], During World War I, the Famous Players-Lasky organized a military company underneath the National Guard called the Home Guard made up of film studio employees with DeMille as captain. 1956 theater brochure DeMille's mother sent him to Pennsylvania Military College (now Widener University) in Chester, Pennsylvania, at age 15. [note 4], While filming The Captive in 1915, an extra, Bob Fleming, died on set when another extra failed to heed to DeMille's orders to unload all guns for rehearsal. He was her mentor, while she was for many years his mistress (a liaison which was tolerated by De Mille's long-suffering wife Constance Adams ). [73] There were problems; however, with the perforation of the film stock and it was discovered the DeMille had brought a cheap British film perforator which had punched in sixty-five holes per foot instead of the industry-standard of sixty-four. [315] He was further nominated in the Best Picture category for The Ten Commandments at the 1957 Academy Awards. [290][note 16] Donated by the Cecil B. DeMille Foundation in 2004, the moving image collection of Cecil B. DeMille is held at the Academy Film Archive and includes home movies, outtakes, and never-before-seen test footage. [55][56] However, changes in the theater rendered DeMille's melodramas obsolete before they were produced, and true theatrical success eluded him. Epic. [47] In 1907, due to a scandal with one of Beatrice's students, Evelyn Nesbit, the Henry deMille School lost students. "[35] DeMille had more violent sexual preferences and fetishes than his wife. imported from Wikimedia project. [84] Throughout his career, DeMille would frequently remake his own films. Between 1914 and 1958, he made 70 features, both silent and sound films. Born in 1881, DeMille made his directorial debut with "The Squaw Man" (1914), a story he remade in 1918 and 1931 . [9] DeMille's father was also an English teacher at Columbia College (now Columbia University). [273], As a filmmaker, DeMille was the aesthetic inspiration of many directors and films due to his early influence during the crucial development of the film industry. [303] In 1957, DeMille gave the commencement address for the graduation ceremony of Brigham Young University wherein he received an honorary Doctorate of Letter degree. [106] His first film in the new production company, DeMille Pictures Corporation, was The Road to Yesterday in 1925. [275] Scorsese said he had viewed The Ten Commandments forty or fifty times. His films were distinguished by their epic . [60] In addition to directing, DeMille was the supervisor and consultant for the first year of films made by the Lasky Feature Play Company. Discover the real story, facts, and details of Cecil B. DeMille. According to director of photography Janusz Kaminski, Steven Spielberg's earliest home movies still exist, and were consulted for the scene in "The Fabelmans" in which young Sammy Fabelman recreates a train crash scene from Cecil B. DeMille's 1952 film "The Greatest Show on Earth." "We've watched them before, but they are a little too primitive [] [26] The aim of the school was to teach young women to properly understand and fulfill the women's duty to herself, her home, and her country. "[267] Salvador Dal wrote that DeMille, Walt Disney and the Marx Brothers were "the three great American Surrealists". DeMille would stick to his large-budget spectaculars for the rest of his career. The continued success of his productions led to the founding of Paramount Pictures with Lasky and Adolph Zukor. [211] He despised actors who were unwilling to take physical risks, especially when he had first demonstrated that the required stunt would not harm them. . Belasco was known for adding realistic elements in his plays such as real flowers, food, and aromas that could transport his audiences into the scenes. [170] DeMille's autobiography was mostly completed by the time DeMille died and was published in November 1959. He consistently was criticized for producing shallow films without talent or artistic care. [32] From 1904 to 1905, DeMille attempted to make a living as a stock theatre actor with his wife Constance. [112] He was also a real estate speculator,[113] an underwriter of political campaigns, and vice president of Bank of America. [39] In the summer of 1905 DeMille joined the stock cast at the Elitch Theatre in Denver, Colorado. Eventually, he became manager of the agency and later, a junior partner with his mother. [152] Art Arthur also interviewed people for the autobiography. Birthplace: Ashfield, MA Location of death: Hollywood, CA Cause of death: Heart Failure Remains: Bu. Any problems on the set were often fixed by writers in the office rather than on the set. U.S. State: Massachusetts. The school closed, and Beatrice filed for bankruptcy. Additionally, during the war, DeMille volunteered for the Justice Department's Intelligence Office, investigating friends, neighbors, and others he came in contact with in connection with the Famous Players-Lasky. [69] DeMille rented a barn to function as their film studio. The longest-living Oscar winner is a recipient of the Golden Globes' prestigious Cecil B. DeMille Award, which he was awarded in 1977, and he received the Producers Guild of America's Lifetime . [84] His specific use of lighting, influenced by his mentor David Belasco, was for the purpose of creating "striking images" and heightening "dramatic situations". Profile of the Hollywood directing legend who became known for his "spectaculars." Learn how DeMille helped establish Hollywood as the movie-making capital o. The Squaw Man (1914), co-directed by Oscar Apfel, was a sensation and it established the Lasky Company. [138] Despite the criticism, it was Paramount's highest-grossing film of the year. 1902-08-16 Filmmaker Cecil B DeMille (21) weds actress . DeMille left a physical legacy in 1923 when, on completing The Ten Commandments, he buried the Egyptian sets in the sand dunes of Guadalupe. However, Beatrice introduced Lasky to DeMille instead. 21 January 1959. [7] His brother, William C. DeMille, was born on July 25, 1878. Moreover, DeMille's epics inspired directors such as Howard Hawks, Nicholas Ray, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, and George Stevens to try producing epics. [120] After his contract ended at MGM, he left, but no production studios would hire him. "[132] Consequently, he had to resign from the radio show. [179][note 12], DeMille believed his first influences to be his parents, Henry and Beatrice DeMille. He suffered from a post-surgery infection from which he nearly did not recover, citing streptomycin as his saving grace. He had completely adapted to the production of sound film despite the film's poor dialogue. DeMille's trademark scenes included bathtubs, lion attacks, and Roman orgies. [46] Life was difficult for DeMille and his wife as traveling actors; however, traveling allowed him to experience part of the United States he had not yet seen. In 1923, DeMille released a modern melodrama The Ten Commandments which was a significant change from his previous stint of irreligious films. The director Cecil B. died at the age of 77. [230] Actor Charlton Heston admitted DeMille was, "terribly unfashionable" and Sidney Lumet called Demille, "the cheap version of D.W. Griffith," adding that DeMille, "[didn't have]an original thought in his head," though Heston added that DeMille was much more than that. Cecil B. DeMille Born: 1881-08-12, Ashfield, Massachusetts, USA Education: NY Academy of Dramatic Arts Ethnicity: Caucasian Death Date:-0001-11-30 . [207], DeMille made stars of unknown actors: Gloria Swanson, Bebe Daniels, Rod La Rocque, William Boyd, Claudette Colbert, and Charlton Heston. Cecil B. DeMille: Film director from the United States (1881 - 1959), Actor, Writer, Film producer, Film director, Film editor, Screenwriter, Playwright, Stage actor . Cause of Death: Heart failure. Age. His silent era films often included the "battle of the sexes" theme due to the era of women's suffrage and the enlarging role of women in society. [136] During pre-production of Union Pacific, DeMille was dealing with his first serious health issue. Further illustrated by his home life, DeMille required formality and politeness at home. In the audience was Charles Frohman who would cast DeMille in his play Hearts are Trumps, DeMille's Broadway debut. The legendary comedian, 61, has been confirmed to receive one of the night's highest honors, the Cecil B. DeMille Award, given as a way to honor "outstanding contributions to the world of entertainment," per the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. [58], Desiring a change of scene, Cecil B. DeMille, Jesse Lasky, Sam Goldfish (later Samuel Goldwyn), and a group of East Coast businessmen created the Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company in 1913 over which DeMille became director-general. [319] The Ten Commandments is broadcast every Saturday at Passover in the United States on the ABC Television Network. is the 10th plague, in which the Angel of Death is imagined as a thick . He called this place, "Paradise", declaring it a wildlife sanctuary; no shooting of animals was allowed besides snakes. Biography: Cecil B. deMille is one of the most important and successful filmmakers Hollywood has ever produced. A dark, exotic beauty, Katherine DeMille was a fascinating screen presence in the 1930s and 1940s. Beatrice DeMille's family was not in attendance, and Simon Louvish suggests that this was to conceal DeMille's partial Jewish heritage. [33] They had met in a theater in Washington D.C. while they were both acting in Hearts Are Trumps. However, his earlier films The Captive, Kindling, Carmen, and The Whispering Chorus are more serious films. DeMille told the actor that he was "one hundred percent yellow". DeMille is one of the more commercially successful film directors in history[246] with his films before the release of The Ten Commandments estimated to have grossed $650million worldwide. [289] The Dunes Center in Guadalupe, California contains an exhibition of artifacts uncovered in the desert near Guadalupe from DeMille's set of his 1923 version of The Ten Commandments, known as the "Lost City of Cecil B. Explore Cecil B. DeMille's biography, personal life, family and cause of death. His first three films were Westerns, and he filmed many Westerns throughout his career. According to Simon Louvish, these films reflected DeMille's inner thoughts and opinions about marriage and human sexuality. He related a story that he maintained his self-control when Gloria Swanson sat on his lap, refusing to touch her. [242] Another common theme in DeMille's films is the reversal of fortune and the portrayal of the rich and the poor, including the war of the classes and man versus society conflicts such as in The Golden Chance and The Cheat. He later moved to writing and directing stage productions, some with Jesse Lasky, who was then a vaudeville producer. The first 24 of his silent films were made in the first three years of his career (1913-1916). [10] At the military college, even though his grades were average, he reportedly excelled in personal conduct. DeMille". Heart Ailment. Robin Williams won the Cecil B. DeMille Awards in 2005. [183] DeMille's father worked with David Belasco theatrical producer, impresario, and playwright. William had been a successful playwright, but DeMille was suffering from the failure of his plays The Royal Mounted and The Genius. [185] Similar to Belasco, DeMille's theatre was revolved around entertainment, rather than artistry. It was the longest (3 hours, 39 minutes) and most expensive ($13million) film in Paramount history. He began his career with reserved yet brilliant melodramas; from there, his style developed into marital comedies with outrageously melodramatic plots. DeMille traveled abroad to find employment until he was offered a deal at Paramount. [62] When William found out that DeMille had begun working in the motion picture industry, he wrote DeMille a letter, disappointed that he was willing "to throw away [his] future" when he was "born and raised in the finest traditions of the theater". He was entombed at the Hollywood Memorial Cemetery (now known as Hollywood Forever). [101], After five years and thirty hit films, DeMille became the American film industry's most successful director. Still, the members unanimously approved it. [283] In response to the claims, DeMille donated some of the profits from The King of Kings to charity. [100] Consequently, Beatrice deMille introduced the Famous Players-Lasky to Wilfred Buckland, who DeMille had known from his time at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and he became DeMille's art director. [309][310][note 17] For his contribution to the motion picture and radio industry, DeMille has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. [23][note 2] DeMille's parents operated a private school in town and attended Christ Episcopal Church. [79][note 3], Cecil B. DeMille's second film credited exclusively to him was The Virginian. [129] DeMille also liked Franklin D. Roosevelt, however, finding him charismatic, tenacious, and intelligent and agreeing with Roosevelt's abhorrence of Prohibition. Cecil B. DeMille's final film, another version of The Ten Commandments , is his most widely seen work, thanks to Easter-time television programming, but it is not one of his most respected. They also learned that other filmmakers were successfully shooting in Los Angeles, even in winter. [191] DeMille was the first director to connect art to filmmaking; he created the title of "art director" on the film set. Broadway Actor. [190], DeMille's filmmaking process always began with extensive research. Now he wants to make the life of Moses. The Roaring Twenties were the boom years and DeMille took full advantage, opening the Mercury Aviation Company, one of America's first commercial airlines. Self - Actor, The F.B.I. MGM distributed the film in 1941 and donated profits to World War II relief charities. At least one DeMille film can represent each film genre. His tentative plan was to shoot a film in Arizona, but he felt that Arizona did not typify the Western look they were searching for. DeMille plays himself in the film. However, the films of his silent era were often thematically different from the films of his sound era. [86] A large collection of DeMille's materials including scripts, storyboards, and films resides at Brigham Young University in L. Tom Perry Special Collections. His daughter Cecilia took over as director as DeMille sat behind the camera with Loyal Griggs as the cinematographer. [39] Another unperformed play he wrote was Son of the Winds, a mythological Native American story. Although less critically revered than D.W. Griffith, DeMille actually played a more important role in . [171], Cecil B. DeMille suffered a series of heart attacks from June 1958 to January 1959,[168] and died on January 21, 1959, following an attack. [126] DeMille was a conservative Republican activist, becoming more conservative as he aged. [172] DeMille's funeral was held on January 23 at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church. DeMille: The Master of the American Biblical Epic . Still, it was a huge success at the box office. [118] His first three sound films were produced at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Pictorials. The picture of her husband was taken in 1916, the year they bought the house, when he was 35 and an increasingly active and . . Cecil Blount DeMille[note 1] was born on August 12, 1881, in a boarding house on Main Street in Ashfield, Massachusetts, where his parents had been vacationing for the summer. [125], Cecil B. DeMille was outspoken about his strong Episcopalian integrity but his private life included mistresses and adultery. Full name. DeMille achieved international recognition for his unique use of lighting and color tint in his film The Cheat. Spanish Wikipedia. DeMille was accused of antisemitism after the release of The King of Kings,[282] and director John Ford despised DeMille for what he saw as "hollow" biblical epics meant to promote DeMille's reputation during the politically turbulent 1950s.